Wednesday, May 03, 2017

Something Every Decent Person Wants

You have probably seen this video already, Jimmy Kimmel talking about his son being born with a congenital heart disease. He cries through part of the monologue, takes a lot of time to thank doctors and nurses by name, shows pictures of his family. Of course he's got a sense of humor but it was not funny, it was a very emotional talk. Watch it all.

"President Trump last month proposed a $6 billion cut in funding to the National Institute[s] of Health," he said. "And thank God our congressmen made a deal last night not to go along with that. They actually increased funding by $2 billion, and I applaud them for doing that."

He went on to praise the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, for bringing access to health care to people who couldn't afford it.

"We were brought up to believe that we live in the greatest country in the world, but until a few years ago millions and millions of us had no access to health insurance at all," he said. "You know, before 2014 if you were born with congenital heart disease like my son was, there was a good chance you'd never be able to get health insurance because you had a pre-existing condition. You were born with a pre-existing condition and if your parents didn't have medical insurance you might not live long enough to even get denied because of a pre-existing condition. If your baby is going to die and it doesn't have to, it shouldn't matter how much money you make."

He finished with a plea for Americans to get past party lines and think of the greater good.

"Whatever your party, whatever you believe, whoever you support, we need to make sure that the people who are supposed to represent us, people who are meeting about this right now in Washington, understand that very clearly," Kimmel said.

"Let's stop with the nonsense. This isn't football. There are no teams. We are the team. It's the United States. Don't let their partisan squabbles divide us on something every decent person wants. We need to take care of each other."

Right there at the end is the kicker. He uses a word: "decent." Something every decent person wants.

Can you imagine, decency has become political. Republicans have failed to pass a bill repealing health care for Americans because they cannot agree on exactly how harsh to make the law that will replace it. Some are afraid that they will lose votes if they drop the pre-existing conditions requirement, and some are afraid it will appear too "liberal" if they don't cut it. All of them are afraid of voter retailiation if they don't repeal the law, and all of them are afraid of backlash if they do.

Not one of them actually cares if someone is sick and needs a doctor. Here's a former Republican Congressman on Twitter:

Unbelievably, the debate is about economics and politics. What if we brought the concept of decency to the discussion? What if America did the right thing? Everybody knows what's right here. It isn't hard, other countries do it.

"Republican efforts to overhaul the nation’s health-care system collided Tuesday with fierce resistance about how it would affect people with preexisting medical conditions, casting the proposal’s future into deeper uncertainty as GOP leaders scrambled to try to salvage it.

On Capitol Hill, influential Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) came out against the plan, dealing a major blow to proponents trying to secure enough votes to pass it in the House. Across the country, late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s emotional story about his newborn son’s heart condition reverberated on television and the Internet. And former president Barack Obama, who signed the bill Republicans are trying to dismantle, took to Twitter to defend it.

All three voiced concerns about losing a core protection in the Affordable Care Act for people with preexisting conditions, as is possible under the latest GOP plan. Such growing worries threatened to derail the revamped attempt to revise key parts of the ACA — or at least send Republicans back to the drawing board.

“I do think each minute that has passed, each hour and each day, the ‘no’ members are becoming more locked in ‘no,’ and we may be losing members,” said Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.), who favors going back to the original version of the American Health Care Act that was scrapped by GOP leaders earlier this year.

Republicans left their weekly conference meeting Tuesday with no health-care vote on the schedule. The House is slated to recess Thursday until May 16.

In an interview with WHTC radio in Holland, Mich., Upton, a former chairman and current member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said he opposes the House GOP plan because it “torpedoes” safeguards for people with preexisting conditions.

“I told the leadership I cannot support the bill with this provision in it,” Upton said. “I don’t know how it all will play out, but I know there are a good number of us that have raised real red flags.”

A Washington Post analysis shows 21 House Republicans either opposed to or leaning against the bill, and 22 more either undecided or unclear in their positions. If no Democrats support the bill, the Republicans can lose no more than 22 GOP votes to pass it in the House...."

"...Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) told CNN’s Jake Tapper that sick people should pay more for health insurance ― an opinion reflected in the newest proposed version of a Republican health care bill.

Brooks, who is one of the more than 30 congresspeople who make up the so-called Freedom Caucus, a far-right contingent within the House of Representatives, made his comments in response to a claim by President Donald Trump. Trump stated Monday that he wanted to carry over Obamacare policies that protect people with pre-existing conditions.

But the newest version of the bill wouldn’t do that, a fact Brooks emphasized.

“My understanding is that it will allow insurance companies to require people who have higher health care costs to contribute more to the insurance pool,” he said, “thereby reducing the cost to those people who lead good lives.”

Of these people who live “good lives,” he then added, “They’re healthy, they have done the things to keep their bodies healthy, and right now those are the people who have done things the right way and are seeing their costs skyrocket.”..."

"...Majority of Americans Say Trump Has Not Made Progress in Changing Washington

[Donald Trump / Barack Obama] promised in his campaign to change the way Washington works. Based on what you have heard or read about his administration, do you think he has made progress or not made progress in doing this so far?

April 21-22,2017 - Trump: 40% said he'd made progress, 54% said he had not

April 20-12, 2009 - Obama: 53% said he'd made progress, 45% said he had not..."

"FBI Director James Comey told senators Wednesday that the agency is looking into whether employees leaked information about the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails to members of Donald Trump’s team, including Rudy Giuliani.

Shortly before the election, Comey announced that he was reopening the probe into Clinton’s private server after more emails were found on the computer of former Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who was married to a top Clinton aide.

A few days later, Giuliani went on Fox News and bragged that he knew in advance about the new emails.

“Did I hear about it? You’re darn right I heard about it,” said Giuliani, a prominent Trump surrogate and former New York City mayor. He added that he had expected the news to come out weeks before.

Comey said he didn’t yet know whether anyone in the FBI had leaked information about the investigation to Giuliani or others, but it was a matter that he was “very very interested in.”

“If I find out that people were leaking information about our investigations, whether to reporters or to private parties, there will be severe consequences,” he told Sen. Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday.

“But you are looking into it?” Leahy asked.

“Correct,” Comey replied. He said he would let the committee know the findings of this investigation, although he might not release them publicly..."

Patton Oswalt ✔@pattonoswaltJoe, you won't even pay child support for your OWN kids. We already knew you felt this way, you worm. No need to tell us -- we're good. https://twitter.com/WalshFreedom/status/859462346275782656 …3:54 PM - 2 May 2017

"WASHINGTON (AP) -- As one justice settles into his new job at the Supreme Court, is another about to leave?

Eighty-year-old Justice Anthony Kennedy is so far refusing to comment on speculation that he may soon retire after 29 years on the court.

But that hasn't stopped President Donald Trump and, obliquely, the Republican senator in charge of high court confirmation hearings from weighing in on the prospect that Kennedy could step down as soon as this spring or summer.

Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, told reporters last month, "I would expect a resignation this summer." He did not name any names but cited a "rumored" retirement.

Kennedy's departure would give Trump a second Supreme Court vacancy and the chance to cement conservative control of the court for a decade or more. Justice Neil Gorsuch, Trump's first nominee, joined the court last month.

Trump said he would choose from the same list of candidates he unveiled during the campaign from which he plucked Gorsuch.

Kennedy has been the crucial swing vote on the high court for more than a decade. He has sided with the liberal justices on gay rights and abortion rights, as well as some cases involving race, the death penalty and the rights of people detained without charges at the Guantanamo Bay naval base. He has written all the court's major gay-rights decisions, including the 2015 ruling that declared same-sex marriage is a constitutional right nationwide.

Kennedy has scheduled his reunion of law clerks a year earlier than usual, on the last weekend in June. That change, first reported by the Above the Law legal blog, first fueled speculation that Kennedy is considering retirement.

Some of the roughly 100 clerks who have worked for Kennedy at the Supreme Court thought there might be something to the change. One former clerk, speaking on condition of anonymity in adherence to long-held court tradition on clerk-justice relationships, said he thought the reunion was scheduled in that manner because of the thought that Kennedy would be retiring.

Other clerks, who also would not agree to be named, said Kennedy naturally is considering retirement because he is past his 80th birthday and thinks that some of his colleagues remained in their jobs too long. A nominee of President Ronald Reagan, Kennedy also would prefer to be replaced by a Republican, those clerks said.

It is unclear how Trump's election may have shaped Kennedy's thinking. But he appears to have a warmer relationship with Trump and his family than was known or necessarily expected. Kennedy invited Ivanka Trump to a February argument at the court, where she and her daughter sat in a section reserved for justices' guests. Kennedy's younger son, Gregory, spent time on the Trump team that worked at NASA beginning with Trump's inauguration. Trump and Kennedy themselves had a brief but warm exchange on the floor of the House of Representatives following Trump's first address to Congress in February.

Few obstacles seem to stand in the way of confirming a new justice this year or next. Republicans control the Senate, and after changing the rules, have wiped out the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees and the need for 60 votes to defeat it.

The other two older justices, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 84, and Stephen Breyer, 78, are Democratic appointees who would not appear to be going anywhere during a Trump administration if they can help it. "I love my job," Ginsburg told a Georgetown University audience last week

Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.), a member of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, talked to CNN’s Erin Burnett this week about health care, and his intention to kill the Affordable Care Act. The host pointed to a Republican voter, featured on an earlier segment, who’d be dead if it weren’t for “Obamacare.” She asked for his reaction.

“I would say though … there really is no lack of health care. If people really need it, if they show up to the emergency room, they do get care, it just gets passed on to other folks.”

The host pointed to the fact that woman in question had $1 million in cancer treatments, adding, “You’re not going to get that by showing up in an emergency room.”

DeSantis then changed the subject.

And while that was probably a good political decision, the fact that Republicans are still, even now, turning to the refuge of the “show up at the emergency room” argument is just stunning.

As regular readers may recall, this pops up from time to time – remember when Mitt Romney used it shortly before the 2012 election? – but it hasn’t improved with age.

Let’s set the record straight again. It’s true that in the United States, the system has long allowed the uninsured to receive emergency treatment at public hospitals’ emergency rooms.

It is, however, extremely expensive to treat patients this way. It’s far cheaper – and more medically effective – to provide preventative care to insured people so that people don’t have to wait for a medical emergency to seek treatment.

For that matter, as DeSantis mentioned, when sick people with no insurance go to the E.R. for care, they often can’t afford to pay their bills. Those costs are ultimately spread around to everyone else – effectively creating the most inefficient system of socialized medicine ever devised, which makes it that much more unusual that the Freedom Caucus member touted this model as if it has merit.

What’s more, emergency rooms tend to be great at treating emergencies, but those needing chemotherapy can’t exactly stop by the e.r. and say, “My Republican congressman sent me.”

I realize GOP lawmakers are feeling a little desperate when it comes to health care reform, but for everyone’s sake, they’ll have to do better than this."

"and how does he know what would have happened if he had been poor and without insurance?"

Look who didn't bother listening to the videotape JimK so thoughtfully provided.

Had you listened, you'd have learned what Jimmy Kimmel had to say.

“Before 2014, if you were born with congenital heart disease like my son was, there was a good chance you would never be able to get health insurance because you had a preexisting condition,” Kimmel said. “You were born with a preexisting condition, and if your parents didn’t have medical insurance, you might not even live long enough to get denied because of a preexisting condition.”

He concluded: “I saw a lot of families there, and no parent should ever have to decide if they can afford to save their child’s life. It just shouldn’t happen. Not here.”

Donald J. Trump ✔@realDonaldTrumpI was the first & only potential GOP candidate to state there will be no cuts to Social Security, Medicare & Medicaid. Huckabee copied me.11:38 AM - 7 May 2015

The low-income health insurance program provides benefits to 11 million low-income seniors and people with disabilities who also receive Medicare coverage. It’s the largest source of funding for long-term care ― including nursing home care ― paying for more than half of those services in 2013. What’s more, over 37 million children receive their health insurance through Medicaid.

Now, Trump is going back on his campaign promise. He’s backing House Republicans’ bill to replace Obamacare ― which reduces Medicaid spending by $839 billion over the next 10 years. After an earlier version of the legislation collapsed in March, it has been amended to appease conservative hardliners who demanded fewer protections for sick people, while the Medicaid cuts remain intact.

The Honorable Lindsey Graham, Chairman Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary Washington, DC 20510

The Honorable Sheldon Whitehouse, Ranking Member Subcommittee on Crime and TerrorismU.S. Senate Committee on the JudiciaryWashington, DC 20510

Dear Chairman Graham and Ranking Member Whitehouse:

I write on behalf of my client, Ambassador Susan E. Rice, in response to Senator Graham’s invitation to Ambassador Rice to testify at a May 8, 2017 hearing before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism entitled “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election.”

While Ambassador Rice commends the Subcommittee’s efforts to examine this matter of extraordinary national significance, it is extremely rare for the Congress to request the testimony of a former senior advisor to the President given the longstanding and well-recognized separation of powers concerns at issue. Moreover, Chairman Graham’s invitation was extended only after the hearing was noticed, less than two weeks before the hearing was scheduled to occur, and without consultation with Ambassador Rice, a professional courtesy that would customarily be extended to any witness. Notwithstanding the significance of these concerns, Ambassador Rice is prepared to assist Congressional inquiries into Russian election interference because of the important national interests at stake, provided they are conducted in a bipartisan manner, and as appropriate, in classified session.

In this case, however, Senator Whitehouse has informed us by letter that he did not agree to Chairman Graham’s invitation to Ambassador Rice, a significant departure from the bipartisan invitations extended to other witnesses. Under these circumstances, Ambassador Rice respectfully declines Senator Graham’s invitation to testify.

Again, and as Ambassador Rice has stated publicly, she supports and is committed to assisting the bipartisan Congressional inquiries into Russian interference in the 2016 election, given the utmost importance of this matter to our national security.

"Ambassador Rice is prepared to assist Congressional inquiries into Russian election interference because of the important national interests at stake, provided they are conducted in a bipartisan manner, and as appropriate, in classified session.

In this case, however, Senator Whitehouse has informed us by letter that he did not agree to Chairman Graham’s invitation to Ambassador Rice, a significant departure from the bipartisan invitations extended to other witnesses"

so, she'll only testify if the testimony is secret and only if there is no Democrat who objects

riiight, supposedly she has earth-shaking testimony with "important national interests at stake" but can't get give it because a Democrat has decided to object

1: They come here because they are almost broke, using their life savings to come here and find a better paying job. You're not going to get much out of them.2: Trump is putting up a great big wall so they stop coming. Didn't think that one through, did you.

"and, btw, we'd don't have to like you"

If I ever get to the point where you like me, just shoot me - obviously, something would have had to have gone terribly wrong with my life to reach that point.

"just keep your mouth shut and stay out of jail"

Hell no. This country was founded on something called "Freedom of Speech. Look it up.

As President Donald Trump met with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in New York on Thursday, he voiced his optimism about the American Health Care Act.

"It's a very good bill right now, the premiums are going to come down very substantially, the deductibles are going to come down," said Trump in a press conference with Turnbull. "It's going to be fantastic health care. Right now, Obamacare is failing."

The next comment Trump made; however, drew amusement from Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont during an interview on MSNBC's "All in with Chris Hayes."

"I shouldn't say this to our great gentlemen and my friend from Australia ... cause you have better healthcare than we do."

Australia's universal healthcare system is administered by the federal government.

"Wait a minute ... the president has just said it," Sanders exclaimed as he erupted in laughter. "Let's take a look at the Australian healthcare system. And let's move — maybe he wants to take a look at the Canadian system or systems throughout Europe. Thank you, Mr. President."

"Let us move to a Medicare-for-all system that does what every other major country on the earth does — guaranteed healthcare to all people at a fraction of the cost per capita that we spend."

"Thank you Mr. President, we'll quote you on the floor of the Senate," said Sanders.

“They might want to call up ‘Schoolhouse Rock’ on YouTube,” Acosta suggested. “Holding a victory party in the Rose Garden of the White House after something passes in the House, that might be a bit premature.”

He said Trump acknowledged that later in the day, saying the bill would likely change in the Senate.

“We’re a long way off from an actual Rose Garden signing ceremony,” he said.

April Ryan, Washington bureau chief of American Urban Radio Networks, said she had channeled “Schoolhouse Rock” as well.

“This is not really a victory, it’s a winning picture that he wants to present, but it’s a partial victory,” she said. “The issue really happens next week, when the true numbers ― the CBO score ― come out, so we’ll see if they’re still doing a victory lap then.”

A self-employed attorney, Poulianos and her two children relied on her husband’s health insurance plan until he died unexpectedly at the age of 41. Her kids were 7 and 10 years old. They all relied on COBRA to get by. When that ended, so did their insurance.

“Obamacare came along at just the right time,” she said. Without it, she would either have had to take a job in a law firm or change careers. But finding a new job with less flexibility would have been tough, since her kids “really needed me.”

Poulianos says her current insurance coverage is reasonably priced with quality care provided. As she watched the House vote, she felt “demonized.”

I’m not sure why I should. I went to school, got married, had kids, worked, employed people, made my children my priority. My husband died and today I feel as if my family is being punished for that. I hear more tragic stories than ours ― people with sick children, pre-existing conditions etc. But I believe that my type of story is part of what’s really devastating and wrong about today as well.

In 2010, Simonds began having bizarre, scary health episodes. She was hospitalized for five days but lacked insurance; she and her husband ran their own business, and his pre-existing conditions made him uninsurable. She was able to negotiate down the $42,000 bill, but she still needed her parents’ help to pay the remaining $18,900.

The following year, she became sick again. Her surgeon told her she needed a couple of feet of her colon removed or she would die. When she told the medical staff she simply wasn’t able to pay for such an operation, they informed her about the Affordable Care Act. She signed up for coverage and had the operation. To this day, she remains sick, recently receiving the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease. And she suspects she will need more operations.

I keep wondering why they want to kill me.

Why are rich people so much more important than I am that their tax cuts are more important than my health? How can people vote to “improve” healthcare, but make themselves immune from the effects? So, you want to know how I feel about AHCA? I am thoroughly, implacably angry.

I would be out in the streets with a pitchfork and torch, if I felt well enough to leave the house (but I don’t). So I will sit here at my computer and figure out ways to get out the vote.

How Could Christians Do This?: Stacy Jarrell, Florida

“I’m somewhere between totally pissed off and sick to my stomach right now. And I’m scared,” Jarrell told HuffPost shortly after Thursday’s vote. She’s 54 and widowed and petrified about losing her health care. Years ago, she said a doctor misread a mammogram that allowed insurers to label her as having a pre-existing condition. Obamacare came along and gave her solace. She makes under $40,000 a year and gets a subsidy to help purchase insurance on the Obamacare exchange in her state.

As a Christian I can’t understand how these people that claim to follow Christ could support, let alone pass, a law that will kill people. While I believe in a separation of church and state, I also believe that as human beings, moral and ethical people need to take care of those that can’t take care of themselves.

The last thing I’m feeling is resolve. If they think there was a resistance before... they have absolutely no idea how this vote has motivated us.

At 21, Petrich was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Treatment was in 2010 and 2011, and Obamacare allowed him to stay on his mother’s private plan. Now 28, he lives in New York and must fend for himself. He has a job as a contractor with no benefits and pays $600 a month for his insurance coverage. It’s a hefty price tag. But it’s a good plan.

Petrich hopes the bill stalls in the Senate. But he’s afraid that Republicans won’t deny the president an accomplishment.

I’m fucking terrified. I can feel the foreboding in my stomach. I’m literally shaking a little bit right now, I was really hoping this wouldn’t pass. I know that, for the rest of my life, I will be seen not as a human being but as a pre-existing condition by private healthcare providers. ...

I already live with a baseline of fear about getting cancer again. Now, it’s terror. Financial ruin at best, death at worst. I’m already imagining a world where I’m starting a crowdfunding campaign to pay for my imagined future treatment.

Medication That Wasn’t Available Without Obamacare: Annie Agle, Utah

Agle, 28, has a rare disease called mastocytosis. She actually receives insurance through her employer, but she’s benefited from the provision under the Affordable Care Act that increased funding for research into diseases. Agle ― who was in treatment Thursday while following the GOP repeal effort in the House ― said that there were several promising medications that weren’t brought to market until the health care law passed because they weren’t considered profitable by the insurance companies.

Under Obamacare, a lot of insurance carriers were forced to present packages and coverage for medications that wouldn’t have even been available to us in the first place. I owe my life now four times over to an immunotherapy drug that didn’t exist before Obamacare and probably wouldn’t have existed without that piece of funding. ...

It’s very disheartening. It’s hard to come to terms with the fact that 50 percent of my country doesn’t feel like that I matter or don’t have a right to live. The difference between treatment and no treatment for me is fatality. It’s not a grey area.

Putting Her Children First: Jill Thompsett, New York

In 2004, Thompsett delivered twins at 31 weeks into her pregnancy. Her son and daughter were in the neonatal intensive care unit for six weeks. Her daughter came home with an apnea monitor because of complications with breathing, while her son underwent three surgeries over the next 18 months. Thompsett’s health insurance plan, which she paid for out of pocket, spiked from $600 to $1,200 a month. She had to drop it.

New York state’s child health care plan allowed her to get coverage for her kids. But it wouldn’t be until 2008, when she took a job at the YMCA, that she was able to buy coverage again for herself. When Obamacare became law, the eligibility for Medicaid expanded to higher income levels. Thompsett, earning $23,000 a year and spending nearly every penny on health insurance and child care, qualified.

That the expansion is suddenly endangered enrages her. For now, Thompsett is making doctor’s appointments to take advantage of Obamacare while it’s in place. Down the road, she wonders what will happen to her family if there aren’t protections for pre-existing conditions.

My twins had a very rough start to life, but I am pleased to say they are smart, funny, honor roll 7th graders. ... I now feel like I am living in a nightmare that gets worse with each passing day of this administration. Somebody please wake me.

Packard, 40, recently moved to Las Vegas and noticed she had a cough. She didn’t have a doctor in the city yet, so she searched around and found someone. After additional trials and visits with specialists, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Self-employed, she gets insurance on the exchanges and had her first round of chemotherapy on Thursday, as Republicans voted to repeal and replace the health care law.

My treatment schedule is eight months of chemotherapy, which will take me right through the end of 2017. If there is still cancer in my lungs, I will need radiation. If the chemotherapy doesn’t take at all, I may need immunotherapy. So there are all kinds of good options in my health, but I may need them in 2018. ...

If Republicans truly believe that Obamacare is some horrible blight on our country, then the thing to do is to work with Democrats to make health insurance better, rather than start with the premise that you need to give the ultra-rich a tax cut and try to figure out how to fudge it for people who need health care to make it the least terrible on them.

‘This Sucks’: Sam Alcabes, California

Alcabes had health care coverage after college through his job in Los Angeles. During that time, he had surgery to repair a herniated disc. When he left his job to attend law school, he was denied health care insurance because of his pre-existing condition. So he entered a high-risk pool run by the state of California, which was expensive and limited in its coverage. After the Affordable Care Act, he got insurance through Kaiser and continues to receive it now through his employer.

I recently gave notice at my job to move on to other things. Now I am concerned that I will lose my ability to obtain insurance from Kaiser or anywhere else for that matter.

I feel like I’ve played the game the right way my whole life. Luck of the draw on having a bad back.

This sucks.

What Happens When You Lose Your Parents’ Coverage?: Kathryn Poe, Ohio

For the past two years, Poe, 20, has been in the hospital on a regular basis, fighting for her life after being diagnosed with three autoimmune conditions. She’s lucky enough to be able to stay on her parents’ health care plan for now but worries what will happen if she turns 26 and the protections for pre-existing conditions currently under the Affordable Care Act are weakened.

It’s incredibly hard to be positive...when you know that the health care legislation that’s passing is just not in your favor. ... At least in my experience in college, people will talk about it and really will have no idea what the essence of the bill means. Oftentimes [people don’t realize] what the real world ramifications are. People are so focused on this Republican dream of Obamacare being repealed that they forget what the real-life implications are for people like me.

The unAmerican GOP win = More tax cuts for the already wealthy, higher insurance premiums for the elderly, eliminate Medicaid coverage for millions of poor children said...

Ryan and his sidekick, the House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, pushed through a bill that, if it ever goes into effect, could upend one-sixth of the American economy and result in tens of millions of Americans losing their health coverage. Since the Republicans failed to give the Congressional Budget Office time to “score” the bill before voting on it, we don’t have any official estimates of its likely effects. But the bill that was passed on Thursday was an amended version of a bill that the C.B.O. had previously determined would raise the number of uninsured people by twenty-four million over ten years, and increase premiums for many others, particularly the old and the sick, as well.

In jettisoning the principle that everybody, regardless of age or health, should be legally entitled to purchase insurance coverage, the House Republicans did something truly awful. The bill would give insurers a lot more leeway to charge higher premiums to old people. Many people in their sixties would see their premiums rise by thousands of dollars; some could see their premiums double. And, even then, they wouldn’t necessarily be getting the same level of coverage that they currently receive. The bill would allow states to opt out of providing all the benefits and treatments that were listed as “essential” under the Affordable Care Act.

The bill passed on Thursday includes a substantial tax cut for the rich, financed by big cuts in Medicaid, the federal program that provides health care to the poor and indigent. Obamacare expanded Medicaid and chip, the children’s version of the program, and, to pay for these and other provisions, the law imposed a tax of 3.8 per cent on the investment incomes of wealthy households and a 0.9-per-cent surtax on their ordinary incomes. That money has helped sixteen million struggling Americans, many of them kids, obtain health coverage since the start of 2014.

"Ryan and his sidekick, the House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, pushed through a bill that, if it ever goes into effect, could upend one-sixth of the American economy"

if you're worried about the economy, rest assured

the increased military spending and hiring from the massive deregulation currently underway will more than make up for it

"and result in tens of millions of Americans losing their health coverage"

not really

"Since the Republicans failed to give the Congressional Budget Office time to “score” the bill before voting on it, we don’t have any official estimates of its likely effects. But the bill that was passed on Thursday was an amended version of a bill that the C.B.O. had previously determined would raise the number of uninsured people by twenty-four million over ten years,"

oh please, that's based on a bunch of assumptions that probably won't happen

"and increase premiums for many others, particularly the old and the sick, as well"

nah

"In jettisoning the principle that everybody, regardless of age or health, should be legally entitled to purchase insurance coverage, the House Republicans did something truly awful"

news flash: Obamacare is seven years old and there are millions of uninsured Americans

"The bill would give insurers a lot more leeway to charge higher premiums to old people."

depends on your state

"Many people in their sixties would see their premiums rise by thousands of dollars; some could see their premiums double"

they are eligible for Medicare

"And, even then, they wouldn’t necessarily be getting the same level of coverage that they currently receive"

they can get what they want

"The bill would allow states to opt out of providing all the benefits and treatments that were listed as “essential” under the Affordable Care Act"

so, if you don't like it, move

there's plenty of open space in CA, MD and MA

"The bill passed on Thursday includes a substantial tax cut for the rich,"

the rich are overtaxed

"financed by big cuts in Medicaid, the federal program that provides health care to the poor and indigent"

states can have any program they want

move to the one you like

"Obamacare expanded Medicaid and chip, the children’s version of the program, and, to pay for these and other provisions, the law imposed a tax of 3.8 per cent on the investment incomes of wealthy households and a 0.9-per-cent surtax on their ordinary incomes. That money has helped sixteen million struggling Americans, many of them kids, obtain health coverage since the start of 2014"

The truth came from the American Medical Association (AMA): “None of the legislative tweaks under consideration changes the serious harm to patients and the healthcare delivery system if AHCA passes. Proposed changes to the bill tinker at the edges without remedying the fundamental failing of the bill—that millions of Americans will lose their health insurance as a direct result of this proposal.”

That’s only part of the problem, explained the group that represents America’s physicians. “Not only would the AHCA eliminate health insurance coverage for millions of Americans,” the AMA added, “the legislation would, in many cases, eliminate the ban against charging those with underlying medical conditions vastly more for their coverage.”

A Wall Street Journal review of assessments of the GOP measure from actual health-care providers was devastating: The American Academy of Family Physicians dismissed the “highly flawed” measure’s attempt to address the crisis it will create for people with pre-existing conditions as “inadequate” and “temporary.” The CEO of America’s Essential Hospitals decried an amendment on funding for high-risk pools as the equivalent of applying “a bandage to a mortally wounded patient.”

Sister Carol Keehan, DC, the president of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, was unequivocal in her opposition. “The recent amendments to the bill, intended to make it more palatable to those who did not support it initially, are even more disastrous for people who have just gotten health care,” explained Sister Carol. “Changing the current rules to undermine essential benefits requirements and protections for people with pre-existing conditions, as well as allowing insurers to set annual and life time caps on the care they cover, would seriously undermine health security and leave many individuals with substandard protection. Even the proposed state high-risk pools would be an inadequate and underfunded solution to a problem that need not exist in the first place.”

Sister Carol counseled that “It is critically important to look at this bill for what it is. It is not in any way a health care bill. Rather, it is legislation whose aim is to take significant funding allocated by Congress for health care for very low income people and use that money for tax cuts for some of our wealthiest citizens. This is contrary to the spirit of who we are as a nation, a giant step backward that should be resisted.”

The Cook Political report, one of the highest-profile political prognosticators, shifted ratings for 20 Republican House members in the wake of the American Health Care Act's passage on Thursday, giving Democrats a boost in their push to take back the House in 2018.

Three GOP members shifted from "lean Republican" to "toss up" categories — Reps. Mike Coffman, R-Colo., Steve Knight, R-Calf., and Jason Lewis, R-Minn., — while 11 moved from "likely Republican" to "lean Republican." An additional six lawmakers moved from "solidRepublicann" to "likely Republican."

Six Republican-held seats sit in the "toss up" category while the "lean Republican" category swelled from seven to 18 members. There are nine "toss up" seats listen in total — six of which are held by Republicans.

Among those who sit in the "toss up" or "lean Republican" districts, five voted against the AHCA on Thursday — Reps. Barbara Comstock, R-Va., Will Hurd, R-Texas, Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., Leonard Lance, R-N.J., and Coffman. Among those listed, Lance and Coffman saw ratings changes.

During and after Friday's vote, Democrats on the House floor chanted "na na na na, hey hey, goodbye," in reference to their hope that Republicans who voted for the bill are voted out of office in 2018 and give Democrats an opportunity to retake the House.

Senators revealed that they do not plan to take up the American Health Care Act and will, instead, write their own bill.

"The Senate Intelligence Committee appears to have sent Carter Page a letter on April 28 asking him to provide extensive information about any contact he may have had with Russian officials or representatives of Russian business interests — and any financial holdings he may have in Russia — dating back to June 2015.

Page, an early foreign policy adviser to President Donald Trump's campaign team, volunteered to be interviewed by the committee in March as part of its investigation into Russia's election interference — and whether any collusion occurred between Trump's associates and Kremlin officials.

The committee, which is led by Republican Sen. Richard Burr and Democratic Sen. Mark Warner, asked Page to make himself available for a "closed interview with designated committee staff to be scheduled for a mutually agreeable time," according to the letter, a copy of which Page sent to Business Insider."

If Senate testimony can be bipartisan and private for Mr. Page, Senate testimony certainly can be bipartisan and classified for Ambassador Rice.

Wow, you are so demented! You are truly twisted! Trumpcare will result in well over 24 million people losing health care and an additional 24,000 people a year dying needlessly and Wyatt/bad anonymous is cheering that on because he thinks multi-millionaires need 10 Rolls Royce cars instead of nine. Wyatt/bad anonymous is a disgusting scumbag.

Wyatt/bad anonymous said his sole reason for voting for Trump was to have him appoint an anti-gay justice. He also said he feared Trump would destroy the country. This is how evil he is, he thinks destroying the country is a worthwhile tradeoff for getting more oppression of innocent people.

Wyatt/bad anonymous your only hope for escaping Hell Fire for All Eternity rests on your God NOT EXISTING.

"Wow, you are so demented! You are truly twisted! Trumpcare will result in well over 24 million people losing health care and an additional 24,000 people a year dying needlessly"

you are deluded, crazy Priya

neither of those predictions has any chance of occurring

"cheering that on because he thinks multi-millionaires need 10 Rolls Royce cars instead of nine"

I think they need equal protection under the law and shouldn't have the government steal their money and give it to someone else - they will likely invest it, rather than buy a tenth Rolls, creating funds for entrepreneurship that will give the underclass the dignity of a job opportunity rather than the soul-deadening redistribution of plundered wealth

"his sole reason for voting for Trump was to have him appoint an anti-gay justice. He also said he feared Trump would destroy the country"

I actually had the same fear about Hillary

and what's this "an anti-gay justice"?

think a boxed set

Trump will likely appoint 4 anti-gay-agenda justices in his first term

any of you who don't like it can move to chilly Canada with crazy Priya

Opposition to Green's nomination mounted over the last week, with multiple groups criticizing his controversial remarks and record.

"When you start teaching [students] the pillars of Islam and you start teaching how to pray as a Muslim, that is over the top and we will not tolerate that in this state," Green reportedly said at a Tea Party meeting.

"If you poll the psychiatrists, they're going to tell you that transgender is a disease," Green also allegedly said in September.

Green, a Republican state senator in Tennessee and former Army medic who did three tours in Iraq, rejected the criticism, saying that the "liberal left has cut and spliced my words about terrorism and ISIS, blatantly falsifying what I've said," CNN reported.

A number of US senators also called on President Trump to choose someone else. Most were opposed due to some of Green's controversial past comments.

Green said in a statement that those who opposed him were using "false and misleading attacks."

"Tragically, my life of public service and my Christian beliefs have been mischaracterized and attacked by a few on the other side of the aisle for political gain," he said.

Trump's first pick for Army secretary was business executive Vincent Viola. He withdrew his consideration in February because of his financial holdings.

"...Trumpcare will result in well over 24 million people losing health care and an additional 24,000 people a year dying needlessly"...

neither of those predictions has any chance of occurring"

According to the CBO, the first version of this atrocious Trumpcare bill, the one that did not allow the states refuse to cover things like maternity care, preventive care, and pre-existing conditions like the recently House passed bill does, Priya Lynn's figures are correct and you are lying through your teeth yet again.

Under the defeated version of Trumpcare, which did not eliminate coverage for those with pre-existing conditions, fourteen million Americans were already estimated by CBO to lose their health insurance coverage in 2018.

Adding those with pre-existing conditions to the list will only increase that number.

The additional cuts in the second, worse version of the Trumpcare bill written solely to attract Tea Baggers' votes, will mean even millions more Americans will lose their health insurance coverage while the top US earners get yet another unneeded tax break, making income inequality even worse than it is now.

CBO and JCT estimate that enacting the American Health Care Act would reduce federal deficits by $337 billion over the coming decade and increase the number of people who are uninsured by 24 million in 2026 relative to current law...

Effects on Health Insurance Coverage

To estimate the budgetary effects, CBO and JCT projected how the legislation would change the number of people who obtain federally subsidized health insurance through Medicaid, the nongroup market, and the employment-based market, as well as many other factors.

CBO and JCT estimate that, in 2018, 14 million more people would be uninsured under the legislation than under current law. Most of that increase would stem from repealing the penalties associated with the individual mandate. Some of those people would choose not to have insurance because they chose to be covered by insurance under current law only to avoid paying the penalties, and some people would forgo insurance in response to higher premiums.

Later, following additional changes to subsidies for insurance purchased in the nongroup market and to the Medicaid program, the increase in the number of uninsured people relative to the number under current law would rise to 21 million in 2020 and then to 24 million in 2026. The reductions in insurance coverage between 2018 and 2026 would stem in large part from changes in Medicaid enrollment—because some states would discontinue their expansion of eligibility, some states that would have expanded eligibility in the future would choose not to do so, and per-enrollee spending in the program would be capped. In 2026, an estimated 52 million people would be uninsured, compared with 28 million who would lack insurance that year under current law."

Soon we will have CBO numbers on the House approved Trumpcare and since it covers fewer Americans, there will be even more than 52 million uninsured American citizens.

"...the CBO says Trumpcare will result in well over 24 million people losing health care and an additional 24,000 people a year dying needlessly"...neither of those predictions has any chance of occurring"

bad anonymous said:

"you are lying through your teeth yet again"

bad anonymous plagiarized:

"CBO and JCT estimate that, in 2018, 14 million more people would be uninsured under the legislation than under current law. Most of that increase would stem from repealing the penalties associated with the individual mandate."

first thing, Priya said 24 million would lose "health care", not health insurance

that's obviously false

everyone gets health care even if they have no insurance

before Obamacare, they went to emergency rooms, which everyone complained about the cost of, but it was cheaper than obamacare

further, Obamacare "insurance" has deductibles that no poor person could afford and funnels people into poor quality institutions to reduce costs

so, either way the poor can't afford insurance but at least prior to Obamacare there were choices

second, what's never mentioned in these media echoes about 24 million "losing" their health insurance is that they will lose it voluntarily because there will no penalty against not having insurance

basically, they will "lose" insurance becaue the government won't force them to have it